Trust Your Gut: Where it Comes From and Why You Should Listen.
Keep Your Gut Biome Healthy to Tune Your Intuition.
Often times I hear teachers in S-classes, Supts in briefings, and wise mentors say “trust your gut”. I fully stand by this advice and promote it wherever I go. However, what is not stressed enough is why we should trust our gut and where does the gut feeling come from. These two questions should be simple to answer but a lot of research has gone into discovering why. Your gut is alive and is in a symbiotic relationship with not only you, but this bacteria culture has been in your family line for thousands of years. Let’s get into how this all works and the importance of why you should “listen” to your gut.
What is your gut biome?
Essentially your gut biome is a culture of bacteria that resides in your stomach. Inside your gut lives 100 trillion bacteria, both good and bad. In fact, there are more bacteria in your stomach alone than all the humans that have ever lived. This culture makes up 100 times more genetic code than is in your DNA. Crazy to think about.
Most of the bacterial culture you have in your stomach is inherited from your long ancestorial lineage. While you were in your mother before birth you started to build your gut biome. When you were birthed you inherited more bacteria as you traveled through the birth canal. While breast feeding you collected even more. If your family has been in good gut health over time the bacterial culture inside your stomach could be the same bacteria your ancestors had 1,000 years ago. This really starts to get interesting once we begin to talk about how your gut biome was tailor-made for you, your DNA, and may be able to remember how your family has interacted with the world for thousands of years… This really adds to the significance of your “gut feeling”.
“Mind blown”
As long as the good bacteria outnumbers the bad bacteria your gut holds a balanced environment. If for some reason your gut biome cultivates more bad bacteria than good bacteria you can start to see all sorts of negative effects on your health. This is directly affected by all sorts of things. It can be caused by diet, geographic location, stress, birthing methods, anti-biotics, and even how you were fed as a baby.
Now, when you get a gut feeling about something you can feel it in your stomach first and then in your brain. There is a reason for this. Your gut is directly connected to your brain through the Vagus Nerve. The Vagus Nerve is the longest cranial nerve in the body. It starts in your brain then branches into two different roots. These two nerve pathways then travel through your lungs, kidneys, liver, and end up connecting to this massive bacterial culture in your stomach. Neuropathways built by your gut biome “jack” directly into your Vagus Nerve. This enormous nerve controls basically all of your most crucial involuntary bodily functions including:
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